Sensation seeking is a trait we all have and includes the search for complex and new experiences. Thrill Seekers, people with high-sensation seeking personalities, crave exotic and intense experiences even when physical or social risks are involved. This course helps learners examine the remarkable world of the high-sensation seeking personality and explores the lifestyle, psychology, and neuroscience behind thrill seekers.

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From the lesson

The Habits and Hobbies of High Sensation Seekers

In this week, we'll look at the hobbies and travel and food preferences of high sensation seekers and discuss why they are so unique compared to the average person. We'll begin our exploration with a focus on emotional regulation and what that means for a high sensation seeker.

Taught By

Kenneth Carter

Professor of Psychology

Transcript

Matt B.Davis is the face of Obstacle Racing Media and widely considered an industry expert. His office, knee deep mud, 8 foot walls, and 20 foot rope climbs. Matt doesn't just write, talk and produce obstacle racing content, he lives it. Having completed almost every brand of obstacle race and mud run since the very beginning, Matt has his finger on the pulse of the sport from all perspectives. Be it elite athletes, weekend warriors, or even first-time race participants. Matt wrote the book Down and Dirty, the Essential Training Guide for Obstacle Races and Mud Runs, and it has been published in Men's Health Sports destination management, Runner's World UK, and Shortlist. He has also been hired as an industry expert for several obstacle racing TV productions like Spartan Race, Battle Frog College Championships on ESPN. You can find Matt sharing on his weekly podcast or on location at race events. Racing his butt off, blogging, tweeting race results, and uploading race participant photos on the Obstacle Racing Media Facebook page. So I'm here with Matt B.Davis, an Obstacle Course Racing Expert. Here to talk a little bit about his industry and what he's learned along the way. So Matt, tell me how you first got interested in Obstacle Course Racing. >> A friend of mine said there's this crazy race called the Warrior Dash where you get a big silly hat, and you eat a big chicken leg, and you go over these obstacles with fire and mud and that looks like fun. So we did that, but then two years later, I signed up for my first Tough Mudder, which was this completely life changing, scary as hell experience. >> Wow, so what got you interested in doing that Tough Mudder? >> Honestly, a friend of mine signed up and I thought, if he can do it, I can do it. Because I had seen, they had shown videos. And I literally was like, I don't want to do that. Like you got shocked and you had to jump in ice water. But it was one of those, do I want to do that? Should I do that? And then once he signed up I was like, all right, let's do it. >> Wow, so what was the most interesting part of that first race? What was the thing that sort of changed you? >> Sure, so first of all when we woke up that morning it was 28 degrees. And just that alone, like running in 20 degree weather would not be fun knowing I was going to have to get wet and jump in ice water and all those other things. I was really, honestly terrified and I remember waking up early before the alarm went off and thinking, how am I going to do this? And when you jump in an ice bath, okay? It was probably 30 degrees by that time and you come out, that literally changes your DNA because the moment from before you jump until after you jump and you come out and your brain is freezing, it changed me as a person. And then throughout the event, it was one of those things that once it was over, I really had this feeling of, I can do anything. >> Wow, and so with that feeling, do you carry it over to other parts of your life? Or is it just part of the race? >> I think absolutely it's something that Joe De Sena, who's the founder of Spartan Race, calls obstacle immunity. You do these things over, and over, and over and your brain either consciously or unconsciously thinks well, it's not as hard as that day. Or remember that time you were suffering in the middle of the night and you kept going, and you pushed through. So it absolutely carries over into my personal life. >> So I was looking at your scores for the sensation seeking and your highest is the thrill and adventure seeking part? >> Right. >> Do you feel like you do thrill and adventure seeking in other parts of your life at all? >> Well it was interesting because some of those questions were like would you want to take all these drugs? There was a time in my life that I did, it wasn't true today but 20 years ago it certainly was. I wanted to try and do everything and there's probably a healthy line and an unhealthy line. I probably crossed over into the unhealthy line a bit. But yeah, I just think it's boring to just do the same thing. >> I always knew I was never going to work a straight job. I had no idea this would be my life's calling but I just knew I could never sit at a desk for a nine to five. >> Wow, now, with the healthy, unhealthy, do you feel like doing the obstacle course racing helps you to do the healthier part of the sensation seeking? >> Yeah, I mean, yeah, because and I think you'll find a lot of people in our community, the OCR community, they've sort of switched addictions as they say, and I'm totally okay with that. If all you're doing is running everyday, then that's your new addiction. Yeah, but if it's going to make me live longer then it's probably not a bad thing and I think that's true. The obstacle race is you find a new community, you're eating different things, you might have stopped smoking or stopped drinking or certainly cut down. And so if this becomes your new thrill, great. >> Yeah, so tell me, what kinds of people do these obstacle course races attract? Like what are the typical kinds of people that you'll see there on a typical day? >> Well I think what all the race companies will tell you and what's true is that it really is all kinds, right? So there's the couch to 5k, right? Man I haven't done anything since high school or whatever and I used to be in this great shape, let me pick this goal and do something, right? And then some of those people go on to make it like a way of life and some don't. And then there's elite athletes, right? I always say the shirtless guys at the front of the race, they want to compete, they want to win money. Some are actually trying to become sort of full-time athletes. And then there's a lot of, what they call the middle of pack folks, like they just want to improve their life, they want to maybe do better than they did last time. >> So there's also really kind of interesting obstacles in obstacle course races, you mention like getting people get shocked, they get an ice bath, what are some of the most interesting kinds of obstacles you've seen? >> They're getting more and more creative because people are learning to train. Once upon a time, you put out some walls, you put out some hay bales, some barbed wire to crawl under, and that was enough. And now the racers are trying to get better and better. The show American Ninja Warrior has inspired them. So these things where you need like crazy grip strength to get through. And even, you'll see very built guys, huge arms guys and they fall off these sort of grip strength obstacles because they haven't worked that specific thing. Do you know what I'm saying? >> Yeah. >> So, there's that. >> Okay, and so did that first race you did, were you frightened at all when you were going through? because there were some things that you probably weren't looking forward to necessarily. But did you feel scared at all? >> Well, I was scared a lot. So I was scared of the ice water. I was scared of any obstacle where you could fall in water. So there's these monkey bars that go straight up and then straight down. And knowing you're going to fall in the water, makes that pretty, especially on a cold day. And then specifically I remember, there was a [LAUGH] they just called it walk the plank, right? You go up say 15 feet. Which doesn't sound that high but it really is. Maybe it's 20 and you jump into a lake. And I remember when I got to the top, there was this military gentleman. I don't know what branch he was in but I remember he said, okay, I'm going to count down now. And he said, one, two, and he said, I'm going to push you when I get to three. So I said, okay, can you start over? [LAUGH] And he said, one, two. And I went, and I might have stood there forever had he not given me that impetus. And I don't know if he was messing with me or that was what he did with everybody. But again, it really changed me, and so now I do those obstacles pretty frequently. >> Right. >> And I think it does get easier. I later jumped off a 30-foot something, at this event called The Cliff. But yeah I was scared of almost all of them, I think. [LAUGH] I mean other than, yeah I mean there is crawling through tight spaces, just through some tubes and what not. And again, it's good for me to go back and remember what it's like for new people because I've done over 100 of these things at this point. >> Wow, so tell me about the community that gets created with the, story about the guys was helping you, right? So what kind of community is there to help people through these races? >> It's really phenomenal. I always say the races are great but it's the people why we keep coming back. So and I do get to sort of pay that forward. So for example, at a lot of these races, there's a big half-pipe you've probably seen. And people run up and then other people grab them and pull them up. And I've seen multiple times, I saw this last weekend, where someone just says, they just kind of look at it and shake their head and they just don't think they can. And we're like come on, you can do it, you can do it. And we help and it might take three or four tries and maybe a few different ways of doing it but I've seen that I mean, not every week, but if you looked for it you could find it every week, if you really looked for it. And again, like that can't help but make your day and it can't help but change you out in the world. >> Right, yeah. >> Because, busy, busy, busy, work, work, work, phone, phone, phone. And then you stop and spend a few hours on the course helping people, it might make you that much nicer. >> So do you feel like you do that? That you find yourself assisting and helping other people out in the world when you might not have before? >> Again, I think it's probably unconscious, right? >> Yeah. >> Like it might, I don't know, I'm probably nicer in traffic as it were, probably hold the door longer for people. It would be great to do a study. >> Yeah. >> And there are people who will spend hours at that one obstacle, right? Just, reaching over and reaching over. And again, I feel like, how can it not affect you in your regular life? >> Wow, so their sort of self-given job is to be the helper. >> Right. >> Wow. >> And it does carry over even in how we travel together. >> So I'm in a lot of Facebook groups. >> Right. >> And someone will post, hey I'm going to such and such race but my ride fell through. Or does somebody have a floor I can crash on? And I have been on both ends of that. When I have been in a better financial position, I have let people crash in my hotel and I've gotten 100 rides from airports. So that part alone is just it's community. Getting in the car with three of your friends and driving three hours to a race then you get all the fun before, you get the race, then there is the drive home afterwards, right? >> Yeah, and so you tell me this expression about someone giving someone their last Cliff Bar? >> Yeah. >> What does that mean? Tell me a little bit. >> So you'll hear that a lot. You'll hear somebody say, some of the longer courses that take 5, 6, 8 hours and there are some 24 hours races which you can maybe get into. And you'll see someone struggling. And someone will literally give you their last piece of food, or split it with you. Your last Cliff Bar, or your last banana because you see that person down and out and you're like come on, let's get through this. Let's get you to the next aid station,or get you back home, or whatever it is. >> Wow. >> And again, you'll see that all the time with these longer races. You'll see someone post, I met so-and-so and, they gave me their last Cliff Bar. >> Wow, that is incredibly generous, that's a wonderful kind of thing. >> Right? >> You went from doing these races to actually talking about them and now it's your future full time job now. >> Correct. >> So how did you make that transition? What was it about it that you decided that you wanted to immerse yourself? >> Sometimes you feel like you have a calling. >> Yeah. >> Do you ever feel like you have a calling? >> Yeah, yeah. And I think it found me, I started doing this podcast for fun and for free, five years ago. I thought, this is cool, I want to learn more about these people, and it turns out that so did a lot of other people. So they enjoyed the content I was putting out, and then, just relatively quickly, I became, you're the guy that knows about these things. And I just, full speed ahead, stayed at it, and there's been a ton of up and downs and, recently I don't know if I sent you, I've been doing these broadcasts with Tough Mudder? Which is, honestly it feels like people say how's it going? And I'm like it feels like what I was born to do, so. >> Yeah. >> I really don't know. >> Wow. >> Another way to explain it. >> So what do you think that's the most misunderstood thing about people who do these races? >> Most of the people think, I think, one of two things. I'm going to get hurt, which is, far more people are injured I think in marathons even, like if you do the percentages. Or that we must be masochists or that you have to be really fit. Because as I said, you'll see people who'll say like, I've got this nagging injury, and I've gotta work x y z. And if you go to these races, trust me, you'll see at least one person in worse shape than you. Plus you might see a military veteran with one leg or someone in a wheelchair, that other people are helping through. >> Or families. >> Right. >> And so it's not just for the sort of, the people that you see on TV. >> I would say I'm what you would call the average softball playing dad. I wasn't in horrible shape, but I wasn't in fit fighting condition and I certainly went out and did it and its made my fitness much better. >> So tell me a little bit about the history of Obstacle Course Racing. Like when did it start? >> So militaries, I think going all the way, I believe the French might have done the very, very first one. I tried to find in my research for the book about this. And they were called obstacle courses. So a lot of over under and through type things, whether it was trees or mud or walls. And historically, a gentleman named Billy Wilson, AKA Mr. Mouse put this thing up in England called Tough Guy. Which, massive obstacles and crazy cold weather and that is sort of the first modern obstacle race. And then, so that was in the 80s, but it never really, he did it once or twice a year. Here in the States, three companies really kicked it off in 2010, 2011. Warrior Dash, Spartan Race, and Tough Mudder, and they've stayed as the number one companies through the last seven, eight years. And there's been a lot of Johnny-come-lately's and there's been a lot of companies that have come around and stuck. And like any business, highs and lows, and the future is still so new. People ask me all the time, what's next, what's going to happen? First of all, I couldn't have predicted many of the things that have happened in terms of sponsorships or TV contracts or the things that have come up. And we'd all be rich, I figure, if we could predict what's going to happen. >> [LAUGH] >> But it's still such a new, new sport. >> Wow, and so what do you think the biggest thing that people get out of the experience of doing it? What do they tell you, at least? >> I think one of the cool things that we hadn't talked about is family bonding. Mothers and daughters, fathers and sons, brothers, coworkers. You could do a lot of team building exercises in the office but actually pushing each other through an event through three or four hours, nothing can replace that. And again, it just becomes a complete lifestyle change for most people. If the people you're around are talking about how they're getting ready for a race instead of where they're going to party this weekend, it's just a totally different lifestyle. >> I mean, the whole idea of the races is to put yourselves into these sort of really challenging experiences and to find your way through, or to help someone through. >> Right. >> And so, what kinds of encouragement do you give them in the midst of that when they don't think they can do it? >> You got this, I think there's a lot of different types of motivation. Like there's the yelling at you kind that's never worked for me. For some people, they need that and they love that. Come on, you can do it. Don't quit, you know what I mean, that's just not me. >> Right. >> I'm more of a pat on the back and hey man, we got this or whatever it is. I do want to mention an experience that I haven't talked about. And that is I have been able to do these with my kids. >> Wow. >> So my son is eight and I've been able to first of all, just spend time with him has been phenomenal. We drived, like I talked about doing it with friends earlier. It becoming a ritual for us that we drive to the race together, we race together, we go to Waffle House afterwards. And the fact that he gets to see what his dad does that way, I'm hoping will have a positive effect on him. How does it feel for you to see him struggle and then get through a challenge? It's awesome, many times they do quit. Kids, I've heard, right before they could get through it. And as he gets older, we'll kind of see how that goes. But when he's done and I put that medal on him, it's like the best. >> Wow, well, thank you so much for coming and telling us a lot about this. I really appreciate it. >> Well, this has been awesome. >> Yeah, thank you.

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